


Middle School Romance

by arcadesintheneighbourhood



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Best Friends, College, F/M, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, High School, Love, Middle School
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 16:24:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13744785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arcadesintheneighbourhood/pseuds/arcadesintheneighbourhood
Summary: "They were a middle school romance, she told herself. They weren’t meant to last longer than a week."OrHow Max and Lucas ended up getting together for a lifetime.





	Middle School Romance

They were a middle school romance, she told herself. They weren’t meant to last longer than a week.

 

And at first, they didn’t. They did the typical middle-school relationship things: they walked around the mall with their hands sticky from pretzel grease and yellow mustard, they bumped numb, awkward lip against numb, awkward lip as they waited for his mom’s van, and the next month, they forgot about first kisses and hand-holding and went back to laughing and competing for the top score on Dig Dug (she always won, of course) with The Paladin, The Cleric, The Bard, and The Mage.

 

It was just supposed to be a middle school romance.

 

But the thing about Lucas Sinclair was that he drew her in. He drew her in with his stupid warm, brown eyes and the way he would stand by her locker and talk to her even when his classes were on the other side of the building. He drew her in with the purposeful way he listened to her- with the way his face changed from joy to sorrow to empathy even with the barely noticeable shifts in her tone. He drew her in with the way he memorized details about her dad even though he never met him (“Hey, your Dad likes Chuck Berry, right?”) and how when they got closer and closer, he would quell the worries that kept her up at night, he would reassure her she was great, she was cool and super smart and like _, totally tubular_. He drew her in with the way he would drop whatever he was doing to tell her bad jokes as he gazed into her red-rimmed eyes (“You’re not super funny, you know that stalker?” She would tease. “I know,” He would say as he nudged her with his shoulder. “But at least you’re not crying anymore.”) He drew her in with the way he pretended to be burdened by his family, but asked his dad for homework help and helped his mom with the dishes and let Erica curl up into his arms after the girls at school were mean to her.

 

It was just supposed to be a middle school romance, until she wanted more.

 

But she shook her feelings off because, what was the point? She was going to college in California and he was going to college in Massachusetts and they would probably drift apart season after season until she wouldn’t remember the last time she talked to him, right? Right.

 

But as the days faded into each other, she and Lucas kept their daily phone calls and wrote each other sweet, handwritten letters that extended week by week as Max thought of all the things she needed to tell him.

 

_I saw a new pair of binoculars in the store today. Maybe I should get them for you, stalker?_

_Presumptuous was in my reading assignment today. Remember when Dustin didn’t know that word?_

_I said totally tubular the other day without realizing it and everyone looked at me like I was crazy. I guess you’re rubbing off on me._

And she skated around her feelings convincing herself, _we’ll fade apart, we’ll fade apart, we’re just friends, we’re just friends_ , until one day, the week before she flew back to Hawkins for summer break, she sat at her desk and stared at the “I love you” she had unconsciously wrote and realized she was tired of erasing it like she did in every letter.

 

 _Why are we even pretending anymore?_ She asked herself.

So on Tuesday as soon as she reached her mom’s house, she dialed Lucas’ number and tapped her foot against the floor, praying _Please pick up, please pick up, please pick up_ and sighing after the line rang nine- no, ten- times.

 

“Hey stalker, I just got back,” She said after the _Please leave a message after the tone,_ hoping he would hear it soon because it had been six months and she was trying way too hard to suppress a smile while she talked to him over a stupid machine. “Meet tomorrow at 4 in the mall. In front of the pretzel stand.”

 

And so came Wednesday and she was standing in front of the pretzel stand at 4:10 PM, her hands coated with grease and yellow mustard and her eyes heavy with water because the only way Lucas was late was if he had dressed up for the occasion and there was no way he did that, right? No one dressed up to go to malls.

But in through the doors walked Lucas, her Lucas, with a button-up shirt and clean pants and black dress shoes and she couldn’t help but grin because- _god, this dork dressed up for a date in the mall._

 

“Hey,” He greeted as his big, gentle hands pulled her into a hug. She clenched the back of his coat as he buried his nose into the top of her head and inhaled. _I’ve missed this,_ Max thought. “I’m sorry I took so long.”

 

“It’s okay,” She replied, her eyes filling again because _finally, just finally, they didn’t have to pretend._ “It took me a while to get here, too.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> LUMAX IS SOOOOO CUTE AND THEY NEED MORE APPRECIATION! I love them lots and I hope you do too! Let me know what you thought down in the comments section!


End file.
